The other half of the story...

In June this year, California Governor Jerry Brown signed SB 277, a law that made vaccines mandatory, eliminating the right to abstain due to religious or conscientious reasons. Now, only medical exemptions are granted. While this law is undoubtedly great, it has been highly polarizing, for reasons that are honestly difficult to understand. Due to the “anti-vax” movement (including Jenny McCarthy, Jim Carrey, and RFK, Jr.) an increasing number of people have been duped by the insidious lie that there is any correlation between vaccines and autism. As a result, diseases that were eradicated decades ago have returned in several large outbreaks.

Despite the fact that the whole movement was predicated upon a fraudulent paper, the anti-vax movement has gained strength in recent years. Several celebrities openly denounce vaccines, and as a result media attention and the perception of credibility is bestowed upon a belief that simply is entirely false. It doesn’t help when people such as current Republican Presidential frontrunner Donald Trump are vocally anti-vaccine:

Healthy young child goes to doctor, gets pumped with massive shot of many vaccines, doesn't feel good and changes – AUTISM. Many such cases!

In 2009 a four week-old Australian girl named Dana McCaffery died of whooping cough because she was too young to be vaccinated, and the community around her had a vaccination rate that was far lower than average. As a result, the anti-vax movement, by spreading fear and ignorance, killed a child by not providing her with the necessary herd immunity.

Despite the fact that diseases are a very real and palpable threat, Congress gives credence to those who blatantly lie and continue to claim a connection between vaccines and autism. As Yale School of Medicine neurologist Steven Novella wrote in 2010:

No one study can ever be definitive, but now we have a large body of evidence from multiple studies showing a lack of association between thimerosal and autism. This won’t stop the dedicated anti-vaccinationists and mercury militia from continuing their anti-vaccine propaganda, but hopefully it will further reassure those who actually care about the science.

However, in his conclusion Dr. Novella correctly guessed that the study would have no effect on the community of deniers:

No one study, especially an observational study, is ever very compelling. I don’t think this one new study changes the scientific picture of vaccines or thimerosal and autism. But it is one more study that fails to show any correlation between thimerosal exposure and risk of developing autism or ASD. This comes on top of multiple independent lines of evidence all pointing away from the notion that vaccines or thimerosal are a significant cause of autism.

The scientific community is likely to see this as further confirmation of a lack of association between vaccines and autism – just one more piece of the big picture. The anti-vaccine community is likely to dismiss it as either hopelessly flawed or as part of the conspiracy. In other words – this study is unlikely to change anyone’s mind on this issue.

The problem is that evidence isn’t necessarily enough to convince people that their beliefs are erroneous. Multiple studies have shown that when faced with evidence against their beliefs, those incorrect opinions are often reinforced. Facts are no match for confirmation bias, so as a result people continue to hold onto views that simply have no basis in reality. This explains many things, such as creationists (also Young Earth creationists), anti-vaxxers, and many others whose beliefs stand opposed to the clear-cut facts.

The best way to prevent the spread of dangerous, communicable diseases is to vaccinate as many people as possible. It shouldn’t matter if people have “personal beliefs” about vaccines, because the science is not subjective. Vaccines either are effective, or they are not—and all the facts show overwhelmingly that vaccines work, and that they are not harmful. In cases such as this, our government needs to make vaccines mandatory for everyone who is medically able to be vaccinated, because it’s about more than just individual beliefs that often are based on ignorance. When it’s something that affects us all, we have to do what’s in our collective best interest. Though the anti-vaxxers might never admit it, they’d owe their health to those of us who understand the importance of herd immunity. Let’s stop letting children die because they’re too young to decide for themselves, and because they have ignorant parents. As Isaac Asimov said, “Anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that ‘my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge’.”

The Author

That’s why we see religious & political dictatorial ideologists being anti-vaccination in various parts of the planet.

This goes along with all the other bad ideas they’ve been indoctrinated to follow by their enriched ‘wise men’ – whatever the fuck that means when they are as ignorant & unfeeling as rocks, objects that cause great harm when aimed at innocents & propelled with misguided hatred & blind passion.

If only we humans had the balls to sanitize our species of those who have clearly given up the right to a say in the conversation – but we are mostly too soft & emotional to consider or discuss the radical actions that the terrible trajectory the biosphere is on make more clear each year.

We are too touchy, feely, soft & nice to face reality so far, but wait until varieties of shit really hit the fan due to infected faithist dogma & doctrine dragging us off on unsustainable tangents that nature will find ways of stopping.

Natural selection operates without design, direction, purpose or goal, but the results will certainly sort out our arrogant selfishness in big ways, especially when global bad shit happens in combinations far beyond our abilities to limit or control the results.

I won’t be around much longer, but I may have lived past the highpoint of humanity – a sad thought since Homo sapiens are still very immature, with so much still to learn about reality.

Brian Druker

Exactly. It’d be one thing if choosing not to get vaccinated only affected those who abstained—as the old question goes, “How far do we go to save people from themselves?” However, in this case I think mandatory vaccinations would only be beneficial.

I also like your analogy about indoctrinated people and rocks.

Boops

“We should all be anti-anti-vaxxers”

Hell noooo, that would require even more effort on top of what we already waste banging our heads on the wall. Let them do what they want then deal with a decent outbreak. Fingers crossed they’ll wake up after that, or maybe get a little thinned-out.

Donald, though… feel free to open fire on him!
Hi! It’s nice to come across some trusty sane folk…

cueball

Haha– yeah, maybe it’ll finally open their eyes a little.

AnOilMan

I had thought of another solution. We could bill, and jail (man slaughter?) antivaxers if they should be implicated and named in the spread of disease. We should also hold them financially responsible for the damage they cause. (Sending an entire school home for a day would cost bankrupt most people.)

This might seem like a round about way of passing the buck, but really outbreaks cost a lot of money. The twin side of having freedom is of course taking responsibility. This is something antivaxers conveniently forget.

Brian Druker

I like that idea a lot. They endanger everyone, not just themselves– and, as you said, there are also the significant financial considerations. Those whose negligence leads to (for example) their children dying due to preventable diseases should absolutely be prosecuted.